# Lehre und Wehre_St. Louis Missouri_M rz 1860_S71
# AI translation — CHI Digital Archive (demonstration)

The Diligent Practice of the Catechism in Lutheran Times of Old. 71

2. On the Repetition of the Catechism at Certain Times.

Such a repetition took place in many places four times yearly, at the Ember Days; in others, twice a year, or at the very least once, during Lent.

Concerning the so-called quarterly sermons, Polycarp Leyser testifies, in sermons of his own publishing on the subject, "Luther himself, at the very outset of the Gospel, ordained very well and usefully that every quarter the other customary sermons should stand aside for two weeks, and that the Catechism should be expounded and explained in eight sermons" — a Christian arrangement that many other churches likewise kept up for many years. This agrees entirely with Dr. Luther's own judgment, "that there is no stronger, better art for keeping people at their devotions and holding the church together altogether, than the Catechism, as we experience daily."

The same provisions concerning such quarterly sermons are found in almost all the church orders drawn up by Dr. Bugenhagen, and indeed first of all in the one for Brunswick from the year 1528, where this arrangement proved itself over two centuries. Thus the whole Catechism was there preached through and examined through every quarter by theologians such as Mörlin, Chemnitz, Leyser, and Arndt, among others. The latter's quarterly sermons were appended to his sixty catechism sermons and to his Psalter.

We find this wholesome practice further, at Dr. Bugenhagen's instigation, in Hamburg from the year 1529, and in Lübeck from the year 1530, where he himself, the following year, preached the entire Catechism through four times. A similar provision of the Pomeranian church order of the year 1535 was made more precise nine years later, "that in all towns the Catechism should, four times a year, without being expounded and treated at length every Sunday, be simply and briefly repeated, so that it be finished within fourteen days or less: that the schoolchildren, and otherwise the young boys and girls, be examined at the time when the Catechism is preached, and that the catechumens, who are for the first time to be admitted to the Sacrament, be first blessed in a Christian manner at the altar in the church, and confirmed, with prayer and the laying on of hands."

The practice, that a semiannual catechism examination was held by way of repetition, likewise obtained in the Pomeranian churches, as may be seen from a synodical resolution of the year 1560. In Lübeck it was especially the office of the superintendent, twice yearly — namely after Shrovetide and before Michaelmas — each time over two weeks, to repeat the entire Catechism. In Frankfurt an der Oder it was introduced from the year 1638 that every half-year the Catechism should be preached daily for three weeks and examined from it.

As for the yearly Lenten examination, finally, the Electoral Saxon General Articles of the year 1580 give detailed provisions concerning it. According to these, on the six Lenten Sundays an examination was held in the afternoon with